Gordana Siljanovska, nominated by VMRO - DPMNE and Stevo Pendarovski, supported by SDSM, are the two candidates for president of North Macedonia, who are going to the second round of the elections on May 8. The difference between the two is over 175,000 thousand votes in favor of Gordana Siljanovska. In percentage terms, 40.20% of the voters who participated in the first round voted for her, and 20% for Pendarovski. What to expect… Vlado Treneski, a Macedonian Bulgarian, vice-chairman of the Association of Macedonian Bulgarians "Interaktsia", spoke to FAKTI.
- Mr. Treneski, it was expected that the candidate for president of VMRO-DPMNE, Gordana Siljanovska, would have a solid lead in the first round, but such a big difference…
- Such a big difference was expected.
- How do you explain it?
- Bearing in mind the economic, political and social situation of the population in North Macedonia, connected, of course, with civil rights, I can say that North Macedonia is the most favorable country when we talk about pre-election situations. Once again, we witnessed that politicians think that anti-Bulgarian speech brings votes. In this case, now in North Macedonia, both one and the other of the largest parties – VMRO-DPMN and SDSM were anti-Bulgarian. But they are basically like that. Even the last ad (b.r. - see the video) that was released in the SDSM campaign, in which two football players participate, shows the Bulgarian pushing the Macedonian. The Social Democrats by presumption used an anti-Bulgarian theme. Therefore, before the elections, we - as an organization “Interaction” and the brothers from the "Ivan Mihailov" club, we called for a boycott. And let's not forget that the results in North Macedonia are a bit comical if you consider that 48% of eligible voters went to vote. In North Macedonia, we have 1.8 million voters, but only 800,000 turned out.
Where are the other 1 million voters?
This is the question of legitimacy and despite the euphoria of VMRO-DPMN. Note that Macedonian services and Macedonians in Sofia became very active before the vote. I say this with full moral and legal responsibility. Where the Bulgarian services are and what they are doing is another question, but that is another topic. Otherwise, if I have to summarize, there is nothing surprising in the election.
- And what is the general mood among people in North Macedonia?
- People are not satisfied with the Social Democrats. Not to mention the bombs years ago that ousted Gruevski, the trials of Ortse Kamchev (b.r.) the uncrowned business kingpin who took a significant hit after he ended up on the State Department's “Magnitsky” list of US for Corruption), against Sasho Miyalkov (b.r., former director of the Macedonian Security and Counterintelligence Directorate, who led the counterintelligence service for almost a decade, but was accused of organizing the illegal campaign to surveillance involving the wiretapping of over 20,000 people between 2008 and 2015 during Nikola Gruevski's administration) and the heavy abusers of billions. This authority was supposed to clean up some of this crime that happened in Macedonia, which had reached unprecedented proportions, and nothing was done. Gruevski is free in Hungary and will soon return, most likely on a white horse. Miyalkov and Kamchev, who committed abuses and serious crimes, were in a prison with a light regime, of the open type - like the one in Struga, together with people who stole a jar of winter wine or were caught smoking marijuana. When there are elections in North Macedonia, people don't vote “for“, they vote “against“ and here is the result.
- Can the current president and candidate for a second term Stevo Pendarovski reverse the result in the second round?
- We will see. But I will make a digression. Grandma Vanga, God forgive her, I'm not a big fan of hers, nor do I believe much in predictions, but she said,
that “…the key to the fate and future of Macedonia is held by the Albanians“.
And this is already clearly visible in North Macedonia. The Albanian parties - all without exception - have clearly stated that they will not form coalitions with parties that have an anti-Euro-Atlantic orientation. Parties that do not want to support the Good Neighbor Treaty between North Macedonia and Bulgaria, respectively, etc. “French proposal”, which is often called and offered to people in North Macedonia as a “European proposal”. So in North Macedonia, things will definitely move in this direction. There is also something else that impressed me during the VMRO-DPMN rallies. This is an omen. At their rally in Ohrid, I saw only one flag with the 16-foot sun. It was the national flag of North Macedonia until the mid-1990s. All other flags were the national flag today. For me, this means disciplining the electorate, but also the people. The 16-foot flag also carried symbols that the people of North Macedonia were descendants of Alexander the Great, but this is fading today under pressure from Greece. I have no idea how much people noticed this, but it made an impression on me. Otherwise, it is already clear that there is no way out of the “French proposal”, although Macedonianism is flexible and, according to political need and conjuncture, enters and exits the negotiating framework. Politicians call this proposal the “Bulgarian diktat”, because that is how it is presented to them. But current Macedonianism is flexible under pressure from different countries. We have seen the latest report of the US department, which talks about clear discrimination of Bulgarians in North Macedonia. The report came out before the election itself and should have confused the politicians a bit. This is synchronized, of course, but these signs should be seen. After the elections, I expect Macedonianism to go back into its shell, and politicians to start talking that this is not a “Bulgarian dictate”. From this European proposal, there is nowhere to go, there is no movement, so we must expect soon the entry of the Bulgarians into the Constitution of North Macedonia and compliance with the other points in the treaty.